Writing
Intent
At Bledlow Ridge School we believe literacy and speaking are key life skills. Our writing curriculum supports children to develop their spoken language skills and then apply them to their writing, across a range of genres, through teaching composition, vocabulary, grammar, punctuation and spelling. We endeavour to prepare all pupils for a successful transition to secondary school as confident, creative writers with high standards of spoken and written English. We aim to support all children to develop into articulate and imaginative communicators, who are well-equipped with the skills they need to become life-long learners.
Our teachers are enthusiastic and passionate, and model high expectations, providing all children with the tools and knowledge necessary to become successful writers. By modelling high standards of writing, we aim for each child to grow as a confident and independent writer, who is able to analyse and edit their own work to ensure it is effective and appropriate for the audience and purpose. We strive to ensure that English is enjoyed by all pupils and that it challenges them to be creative and produce high-quality pieces of writing.
Implementation
At Bledlow Ridge School our pupils are stimulated by a wide range of books which support them in writing for different purposes and for a range of audiences. These books are carefully selected by teachers to ensure they link into our topics and continue to encourage our pupils love for reading. This allows us to teach the characteristics of different genres, features of layout and presentation effectively. Teaching is planned so that grammar and punctuation is taught in the context of the individual literacy units as set out in the National Strategies for English. We have a whole school medium term plan document which ensures that a sufficient progression of skills and genres are taught as the children move through the school. Teachers model the process of writing to ensure children produce high quality pieces of work. Children are given daily feedback and scaffolds where appropriate: we believe that ‘in the moment’ feedback is the most effective way to allow children to make immediate progress. Children are taught and encouraged to independently edit their work using purple pens. We differentiate and support each child to ensure that they are challenged to make excellent progress. Teachers seek to take advantage of opportunities to make cross-curricular links. They plan for pupils to practise and apply the skills, knowledge and understanding acquired through English lessons to other areas of the curriculum. Opportunities to use computing to support teaching and learning in English lessons are planned for and used as appropriate.
Impact
Our children are creative and enthusiastic writers. They are engaged in lessons and produce high-quality writing which incorporates ambitious vocabulary. Through their time at the school, their communication skills are strengthened, and children make good progress. The outcome of writing at the end of Key Stage 2 is above national. Through establishing strong writing skills, children are more equipped to access the entire curriculum and transition to secondary school with confidence in their own ability.
Handwriting
Handwriting is of fundamental importance. It is one of the key foundational skills, therefore handwriting is taught daily in Reception through the use of Kinetic Letters. Starting in the Early Years, children are supported to develop their pencil grip and to take part in mark making activities. Across their Reception journey, there are opportunities for the children to write for a range of purposes such as: labels for pictures/models, captions, lists, instructions, speech bubbles, simple phrases/sentences and stories.
At Bledlow Ridge School, we understand that it is crucial to ensure that these skills become automatic for children, as this enables them to free up their working memory for greater focus on the composition of their writing as they progress through school.
Handwriting is a physical activity that involves movement and recognition skills that need to be learnt and become part of the automatic cognitive skill set of the pupil. To achieve this, we follow the Kinetic Letters handwriting program.
The four threads of the Kinetic Letters program:
- Making bodies stronger
- Holding the pencil (for speed, comfort and legibility)
- Learning the letters
- Flow and fluency
The key principles of the program are:
- Building physical strength underpins handwriting and concentration. This knowledge informs the working positions that children use for writing and the strengthening targets they work on
- Pupils are not expected to do anything before they are developmentally ready for it
- The different components of writing are mastered individually before being used in combination
- Letters are learnt as movements, not as visual shapes, and movement remains central to developing automaticity in letter formation, flow and fluency
- Posture is important in developing the correct position for handwriting and so children are taught how to organise their working position and paper position to enable comfortable and fluent writing from the start
- Correct pencil hold is taught from the start (ie as soon as a tri-pod grip is developmentally appropriate).
By the end of KS1, the aim is that some children will be using some of the strokes needed to join letters; teaching this will start in Year 2. Handwriting sessions are taught to the whole class, with differentiated targets where needed. Additional handwriting and fine and gross motor skills interventions may take place for some children.